The Fourth Book.
Called
"The Key."
1.
Yesterday's Speech, O Asclepius, I dedicated to thee, this
day's it is fit to dedicate to Tat, because it is an
Epitome of those general speeches that were spoken to him.
2. God therefore, and the Father, and the Good, O Tat, have
the same Nature, or rather also the same Act and Operation.
3. For there is one name or appellation of Nature and
Increase which concerneth things changeable, and another
about things unchangeable, and about things unmoveable,
that is to say, Things Divine and Human; every one of
which, himself will have so to be; but action or operation
is of another thing, or elsewhere, as we have taught in
other things, Divine and Human, which must here also be
understood.
4. For his Operation or Act, is his Will, and his Essence,
to Will all Things to be.
5. For what is God, and the Father, and the Good, but the
Being of all things that yet are not, and the existence
itself, of those things that are!
6. This is God, this is the Father, this is the Good,
whereunto no other thing is present or approacheth.
7. For the World, and the Sun, which is also a Father by
Participation, is not for all that equally the cause of
Good, and of Life, to living Creatures: And if this be so,
he is altogether constrained by the Will of the Good,
without which it is not possible, either to be, or to be
begotten or made.
8. But the Father is the cause of his Children, who hath a
will both to sow and nourish that which is good by the Son.
9. For Good is always active or busy in making; and this
cannot he in any other, but in him that taketh nothing, and
yet willeth all things to be; for I will not say, O Tat,
making them; for he that maketh is defective in much time,
in which sometimes he maketh not, as also of quantity and
quality; for sometimes he maketh those things that have
quantity and quality and sometimes the contrary.
10. But God is the Father, and the Good, in being all
things; for he both will be this, and is it, and yet all
this for himself(as is true) in him that can see it.
11. For all things else are for this, it is the property of
Good to be known: This is the Good, O Tat.
12. Tat. Thou hast filled us, O Father, with a sight both
good and fair, and the eye of my mind is almost become more
holy by the sight or spectacle.
13. Trismegistus. I Wonder not at It, for the Sight of Good
is not like the Beam of the Sun, which being of a fiery
shining brightness, maketh the eye blind by his excessive
Light, that gazeth upon it; rather the contrary, for it
enlighteneth, and so much increaseth the light of the eye,
as any man is able to receive the influence of this
Intelligible clearness.
14. For it is more swift and sharp to pierce, and innocent
or harmless withal, and full of immortality, and they that
are capable and can draw any store of this spectacle, and
sight do many times fall asleep from the Body, into this
most fair and beauteous Vision ; which thing Celius and
Saturn our Progenitors obtained unto.
15. Tat. I would we also, O Father, could do so.
16. Trismegistus. I would have could, O Son; but for the
present we are less intent to the Vision, and cannot yet
open the eyes of our minds to behold the incorruptible, and
incomprehensible Beauty of that Good: But then shall we see
it, when we have nothing at all to say of it.
17. For the knowledge of it, is a Divine Silence, and the
rest of all the Senses; For neither can he that understands
that understand anything else, nor he that sees that, see
any thing else, nor hear any other thing, nor in sum, move
the Body.
18. For shining steadfastly upon, and round about the whole
Mind it enlighteneth all the Soul ; and loosing it from the
Bodily Senses and Motions, it draweth it from the Body, and
changeth it wholly into the Essence of God.
19. For it is Possible for the Soul, O Son, to be Deified
while yet it Lodgeth in the Body of Man, if it Contemplate
the Beauty of the Good.
20. Tat. How dost thou mean deifying, Father!
21. Trismegistus. There are differences, O Son, of every
Soul.
22. Tat. But how dost thou again divide the changes?
23. Trismegistus. Hast thou not heard in the general
Speeches, that from one Soul of the Universe, are all those
Souls, which in all the world are tossed up and down, as it
were, and severally divided? Of these Souls there are many
changes, some into a more fortunate estate, and some quite
contrary; for they which are of creeping things, are
changed into those of watery things and those of things
living in the water, to those of things living upon the
Land; and Airy ones are changed into men, and human Souls,
that lay hold of immortality, are changed into Demons.
24. And so they go on into the Sphere or Region of the
fixed Gods, for there are two choirs or companies of Gods,
one of them that wander, and another of them that are
fixed. And this is the most perfect glory of the Soul.
25. But the Soul entering into the Body of a Man, if it
continue evil, shall neither taste of immortality, nor is
partaker of the good.
26. But being drawn back the same way, it returneth into
creeping things. And this is the condemnation of an evil
Soul.
27. And the wickedness of a Soul is ignorance; for the Soul
that knows nothing of the things that are, neither the
Nature of them, nor that which is good, but is blinded,
rusheth and dasheth against the bodily Passions, and
unhappy as it is, not knowing itself, it serveth strange
Bodies, and evil ones, carrying the Body as a burthen, and
not ruling, but ruled. And this is the mischief of the
Soul.
28. On the contrary, the virtue of the Soul is Knowledge;
for he that knows is both good and religious, and already
Divine.
29. Tat. But who is such a one, O Father!
30. Trismegistus. He that neither speaks, nor hears many
things; for he, O Son, that heareth two speeches or
hearings, fighteth in the shadow.
31. For God, and the Father, and Good, is neither spoken
nor heard.
32. This being so in all things that are, are the Senses,
because they cannot be without them.
33. But Knowledge differs much from Sense; for Sense is of
things that surmount it, but Knowledge is the end of Sense.
34. Knowledge is the gift of God ; for all Knowledge is
unbodily but useth the Mind as an Instrument, as the Mind
useth the Body.
35. Therefore both intelligible and material things go both
of them into bodies; for, of contraposition, That is
Setting One against Another, and Contrariety, all Things
must Consist. And it is impossible it should be otherwise,
36. Tat. who therefore is this material God?
37. Trismegistus. The fair and beautiful world, and yet it
is not good; for it is material and easily passible, nay,
it is the first of all passible things; and the second of
the things that are, and needy or wanting somewhat else.
And it was once made and is always, and is ever in
generation, and made, and continually makes, or generates
things that have quantity and quality.
38. For it is moveable, and every material motion is
generation; but the intellectual stability moves the
material motion after this manner.
39. Because the World Is a Sphere, that is a Head, and
above the head there is nothing material, as beneath the
feet there is nothing intellectual.
40. The whole universe is material; The Mind is the head,
and it is moved spherically, that is like a head.
41. Whatsoever therefore is joined or united to the
Membrane or Film of this head, wherein the Soul is, is
immortal, and as in the Soul of a made Body, hath its Soul
full of the Body; but those that are further from that
Membrane, have the Body full of Soul.
42. The whole is a living wight, and therefore consisteth
of material and intellectual.
43. And the World is the first, and Man the second living
wight after the World; but the first of things that are
mortal and therefore hath whatsoever benefit of the Soul
all the others have: And yet for all this, he is not only
not good, but flatly evil, as being mortal.
44. For the World is not good as it is moveable; nor evil
as it is immortal.
45. But man is evil, both as he is moveable, and as he is
mortal.
46. But the Soul of Man is carried in this manner, The Mind
is in Reason, Reason in the Soul, the Soul in the Spirit,
the Spirit in the Body.
47. The Spirit being diffused and going through the veins,
and arteries, and blood, both moveth the living Creature,
and after a certain manner beareth it.
48. Wherefore some also have thought the Soul to be blood,
being deceived in Nature, not knowing that first the Spirit
must return into the Soul, and then the blood is congealed,
the veins and arteries emptied, and then the living thing
dieth: And this is the death of the Body.
49. All things depend of one beginning, and- the beginning
depends of that which is one and alone.
50. And the beginning is moved, that it may again be a
beginning; but that which is one, standeth and abideth, and
is not moved,
51. There are therefore these three, God the Father, and
the Good, the World and Man: God hath the World, and the
World hath Man; and the World is the Son of God, and Man as
it were the Offspring of the World.
52. For God is not ignorant of R/Ian, but knows him
perfectly, and will be known by him. This only is healthful
to man; the Knowledge of God: this is the return of
Olympus; by this only the Soul is made good, and not
sometimes good, and sometimes evil, but of necessity Good.
53. Tat. What meanest thou, O Father.
54. Trismegistus. Consider, O Son, the Soul of a Child,
when as yet it hath received no dissolution of its Body,
which is not yet grown, but is very small; how then if it
look upon itself, it sees itself beautiful, as not having
been yet spotted with the Passions of the Body, but as it
were depending yet upon the Soul of the World.
55. But when the Body is grown and distracteth, the Soul it
engenders Forgetfulness, and partakes no more of the Fair
and the Good, and Forgetfulness is Evilness.
56. The like also happeneth to them that go out of the
Body: for when the Soul runs back into itself the Spirit is
contracted into the blood and the Soul into the Spirit; but
the Mind being made pure, and free from these clothings;
and being Divine by Nature, taking a fiery Body rangeth
abroad in every place, leaving the Soul to judgment, and to
the punishment it hath deserved.
57. Tat. Why dost thou say so, O Father, that the Mind is
separated from the Soul, and the Soul from the Spirit? When
even now thou saidst the Soul was the Clothing or Apparel
of the Mind, and the Body of the Soul.
58. Trismegistus. O Son, he that hears must co-understand
and conspire in thought with him that speaks; yea, he must
have his hearing swifter and sharper than the voice of the
speaker.
59. The disposition of these Clothings or Covers, is done
in an Earthly Body; for it is impossible, that the mind
should establish or rest itself, naked, and of itself; in
an Earthly Body; neither is the Earthly Body able to bear
such immortality; and therefore that it might suffer so
great virtue the Mind compacted as it were, and took to
itself the passible Body of the Soul, as a Covering or
Clothing. And the Soul being also in some sort Divine,
useth the Spirit as her Minister and Servant, and the
Spirit governeth the living thing.
60. When therefore the Mind is separated, and departeth
from the earthly Body, presently it puts on its Fiery Coat,
which it could not do having to dwell in an Earthly Body.
61. For the Earth cannot suffer fire, for it is all burned
of a small spark; therefore is the water poured round about
the Earth, as a Wall or defence, to withstand the flame of
fire.
62. But the Mind being the most sharp or swift of all the
Divine Cogitations, and more swift than all the Elements,
hath the fire for its Body.
63. For the Mind which is the Workman of all useth the fire
as his instrument in his Workmanship; and he that is the
Workman of all, useth it to the making of all things, as it
is used by man, to the making of Earthly things only; for
the Mind that is upon Earth, void, or naked of fire, cannot
do the business of men. nor that which is otherwise the
affairs of God.
64. But the Soul of Man, and yet not everyone, but that
which is pious and religious, is Angelical and Divine. And
such a Soul, after it is departed from the Body, having
striven the strife of Piety, becomes either Mind or God.
65. And the strife of Piety is to know God, and to injure
no Man, and this way it becomes Mind.
66. But an impious Soul abideth in its own essence,
punished of itself, and seeking an earthly and human Body
to enter into.
67. For no other Body is capable of a Human Soul, neither
is it lawful for a Man's Soul to fall into the Body of an
unreasonable living thing: for it is the Law or Decree of
God, to preserve a Human Soul from so great a contumely and
reproach.
68. Tat. How then is the Soul of Man punished, O Father;
and what is its greatest torment.
69. Hermes. Impiety, O my Son; for what Fire hath so great
a flame as it? Or what biting Beast doth so tear the Body
as it doth the Soul.
70. Or dost thou not see how many evils the wicked Soul
suffereth, roaring and crying out, I am Burned, I am
Consumed, I know not what to Say, or Do, I am Devoured,
Unhappy Wretch, of the Evils that compass and lay-hold upon
me; Miserable that I am, I neither See nor Hear anything.
71. These are the voices of a punished and tormented Soul,
and not as many; and thou, O Son, thinkest that the Soul
going out of the Body grows brutish or enters into a Beast:
which is a very great Error, for the Soul punished after
this manner.
72. For the Mind, when it is ordered or appointed to get a
fiery Body for the services of God, coming down into the
wicked Soul, torments it with the whips of Sins, wherewith
the wicked Soul being scourged, turns itself to Murders,
and Contumelies, and Blasphemies, and divers Violences, and
other things by which men are injured
73. But into a pious Soul, the Mind entering, leads it into
the Light of Knowledge.
74. And such a Soul is never satisfied with singing praise
to God, and speaking well of all men; and both in words and
deeds, always doing good in imitation of her Father.
75. Therefore, O Son, we must give thanks, and pray, that
we may obtain a good mind.
76. The Soul therefore may be altered or changed into the
better, but into the worse it is impossible.
77. But there is a communion of Souls, and those of Gods,
communicate with those of men; and those of men, with those
of Beasts.
78. And the better always take of the worse, Gods of Men,
Men of brute Beasts, but God of all: For he is the best of
all, and all things are less than he.
79. Therefore is the World subject unto God, Man unto the
World and unreasonable things to Man.
80. But God is above all, and about all; and the beams of
God are operations; and the beams of the World are Natures;
and the beams of Man are Arts and Sciences.
81. And Operations do act by the World, and upon man by the
natural beams of the World, but Natures work by the
Elements, and man by Arts and Sciences.
82. And this is the Government of the whole, depending upon
the Nature of the One, and piercing or coming down by the
One Mind, than which nothing is more Divine, and more
efficacious or operative; and nothing more uniting, or
nothing is more One. The Communion of Gods to Men, and of
Men to God.
83. This is the Bonus Genius, or good Demon, blessed Soul
that is fullest of it! and unhappy Soul that is empty of
it!
84. Tat. And wherefore Father?
85. Trismegistus. Know Son, that every Soul hath the Good
Mind; for of that it is we now speak, and not of that
Minister of which we said before, That he was sent from the
Judgment.
86. For the Soul without the Mind, can neither do, nor say
any thing; for many times the Mind flies away from the
Soul, and in that hour the Soul neither seeth nor heareth,
but is like an unreasonable thing; so great is the power of
the Mind.
87. But neither brooketh it an idle or lazy Soul, but
leaves such a one fastened to the Body, and by it
pressed down.
88. And such a Soul, O Son, hath no mind, wherefore neither
must such a one be called a Man.
89. For man is a Divine living thing and is not to be
compared to any brute Beast that lives upon Earth, but to
them that are above in Heaven, that are called Gods.
90. Rather, if we shall be bold to speak the truth, he that
is a man indeed, is above them, or at least they are equal
in power, one to the other, For none of the things in
Heaven will come down upon Earth, and leave the limits of
Heaven, but a man ascends up into Heaven, and measures it.
91. And he knoweth what things are on high, and what below,
and learneth all other things exactly.
92. And that which is the greatest of all, he leaveth not
the Earth, and yet is above: So great is the greatness of
his Nature.
93. Wherefore we must be bold to say, That an Earthly Man
is a Mortal God, and That the Heavenly God is an Immortal
Man.
94. Wherefore, by these two are all things governed, the
World and Man; but they and all things else, of that which
is One.